Does the Election Make You Want to Be Sedated?
Elections — like roller-coaster rides and horror movies — can keep us in an unhealthy state of high anxiety, individually and together.
In much the same way a horror movie makes your heart race and saliva tinny, the upcoming election has inspired fear and anxiety among Americans.
Witness "Murder by Wheelchair," a parody video of the current health care election debate, produced by FlackCheck.org, part of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. The video injects humor into the heated and emotional suggestion that the Affordable Care Act would send Medicare patients off the cliff, literally.
"I've had patients who are more or less besides them self with uncertainty that 'if this person gets elected' or 'that person gets elected,' " says clinical psychologist Dr. Berney Wilkinson in Lakeland, Fla., "everything we know in the U.S. is going to come to an end." As in, he said, the end of the world.
But fear and loathing have been used so much this by campaigners in the current election season that the average citizen is showing up at his South Florida office worried about national and global viability, says Dr. Wilkinson, who practices privately and teaches at Webster University and University of South Florida.
Uncertainty, insecurity, fear-mongering and anger are staples of election campaigns, most famously in 1964 when candidate Lyndon B. Johnson got voters' attention with a commercial showing a sweet, young girl who plucked the petals off a daisy in a countdown that ended with an image of an atomic explosion. "Vote for President Johnson on November 3," instructed the deep, ominous voiceover. "The stakes are too high for you to stay home."
Before you smirk at the weak and gullible, consider two of Wilkinson's patients who have expressed above-average fear and anxiety over how Armageddon is likely to befall the United States come November: One is 11 years old; the other, 14.
"If this candidate is elected, jobs will be lost and China will take over the world!" are other patient worries, he said. "It's very unfortunate because there are people who believe everything they read, and then suffer from anxiety and can't cope with it."
This prolonged physical response is unhealthy, says Wilkinson. The threatening message sends a psychological response that starts a cascade via the limbic system, washing a glandular, involuntary response of stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline though the system. Ironically, this can lead to he opposite of what candidates and campaigns seek to achieve.
This prolonged physical response is unhealthy, says Wilkinson. The threatening message sends a psychological response that starts a cascade via the limbic system, washing a glandular, involuntary response of stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline though the system. Ironically, this can lead to he opposite of what candidates and campaigns seek to achieve.
Wilkinson says the children's parents "are not particularly political," and the unrelated youths report hearing the Doomsday message on political ads and in discussions at school. Women, he noticed, seem to register higher anxiety than his male patients. A recently released study said women who read negative newsremember it better than men do, and have stronger stress responses in subsequent stress tests, according to Sonia Lupien and colleagues from the University of Montreal, Quebec.
And it's not just women and children, as evidenced by research conducted by the American Association of Retired People (AARP). The group issued the results of their Anxiety Index in August, showing 70 percent of non-retired Baby Boomers — those older than 50 — experiencing high anxiety over the campaign and issues.
"I'm noticing specific symptoms more now than in the past," he says. "I see more Doomsday perspectives. You know, it's taking a toll on people's ability to decide."
The AARP voter survey revealed anxiety over inflation, taxes, the opportunity to retire, financial security during retirement, and the affordability of healthcare. The respondents asked for more information on the candidates' plans to strengthen Social Security and Medicare, the index said. "And they're upset that candidates aren't paying more attention to those issues," said AARP's Web site.
The AARP voter survey revealed anxiety over inflation, taxes, the opportunity to retire, financial security during retirement, and the affordability of healthcare. The respondents asked for more information on the candidates' plans to strengthen Social Security and Medicare, the index said. "And they're upset that candidates aren't paying more attention to those issues," said AARP's Web site.
The Sources of Election Anger
A University of Michigan study in May 2011 found a nuance in voter's response to political messages: When citizens could respond to a specific person or entity, they said they felt anger. But without someone or something to blame, people becamemore angry and anxious.
"It reminds me of the Hunger Games type of thing where you're in constant fear of something bad happening unless you fight to the death to save yourself," says Wilkinson of the books and movie in which teens live in a culture in which they fight to the death over resources. "It's not helping physiologically. It's creating chronic anxiety and impacts on our dietary habits ... and leads to a culture of unhealthiness that can be boiled down to this chronic anxiety."
Does it get better?
If your candidate wins, you will likely feel quick relief, Wilkinson says. After the Supreme Court's decision to uphold the Affordable Care Act, seen as an intense political fight that polarized the country, many Americans reported a sense of relief and a desire to move on.
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